


Meet the Tarlys

by evrybodysdarlin



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-10
Updated: 2013-11-10
Packaged: 2018-01-01 00:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1038197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evrybodysdarlin/pseuds/evrybodysdarlin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Modern high school AU--Sam totally has a gorgeous new boyfriend...but no one in his family believes him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meet the Tarlys

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was a response to an adorable prompt by [](http://essie007.livejournal.com/profile)[**essie007**](http://essie007.livejournal.com/) over at [](http://asoiafkinkmeme.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://asoiafkinkmeme.livejournal.com/)**asoiafkinkmeme** :
> 
>  
> 
> _Modern AU - Sam's family thinks that Sam has made up his gorgeous, athletic, smart, kind and brave boyfriend Jon. Sam's father in particular is mean and makes cutting remarks when Sam talks about Jon. Of course, Sam brings Jon over for dinner to meet his family, and Sam's dad nearly has a heart attack from the "does not compute"_
> 
>  
> 
> [Here](http://asoiafkinkmeme.livejournal.com/3041.html?thread=1309665#t1309665) is the original prompt and my original fill.
> 
>  
> 
>   
> 

Despite his less than warm-and-fuzzy personality, Randyll Tarly was a stickler for family dinners.

Every night, come hell or high water, the Tarly family gathered around the long table in their dining room and forced themselves to coexist long enough to eat a meal together.

The three girls usually sat together, giggling and trying to carry own their own conversation in whispers. Little Dickon spent most of his meal making shapes and pictures out of his food instead of eating it (although he occasionally branched out into shooting food out of his spoon like a catapult, instead). Melessa Tarly tried to keep the peace, with varying amounts of success, and Randyll just rolled his eyes and grunted as he sat at the head of the table.

Sam sat by his mother, as he had since he was the only child in the Tarly family. His most common contribution to dinner conversation was some fact or another that he had read in one of his AP textbooks. These facts were never as appreciated by the rest of his family as he hoped they would be.

So after a few family dinners went by _without_ any interjections about biology or world history, the Tarly family began to realize that Sam was acting strange.

He would just sit at the table silently, eyes on his food, smiling madly as though his peas and carrots were the prettiest sight he had ever seen.

"Sam? Are you all right, honey?" Melessa finally asked one night. "You're being so quiet."

"Oh, yes, I'm fine, Mom," Sam answered hurriedly, shifting in his seat.

"No, you're not," Talla sneered. (She was the oldest sister and far too observant for her own good.) "You're blushing like a tomato."

"I'm not!" Sam blurted out, flushing even darker. "I'm fine. Mom! Make her leave me alone."

"Are you in trouble at school, boy?" Randyll demanded, and the whole family jumped a little in their seats. When Randyll did talk at dinner, it usually wasn't to say anything good.

"No! Dad, of course not. I get good grades, you know that."

"Yes, yes, I know that," Randyll grumbled. "You know I wish that you would go out for the football team. A big boy like you, you could be..."

"Sam's too fat to play football!" little Dickon interrupted loudly, causing sudden laughter from everyone at the table except Sam and his mother.

"Sweetheart, please tell me if something's bothering you," Melessa whispered under the cover of the noise.

"I'll talk to you about it later, Mom," Sam sulkily whispered back.  


After dinner, Sam found his mother alone in her craft room and spilled his story at last.  
  
"I met this boy, Mom," he blurted out.  
  
"Oh, Sam!" Melessa said happily. "Why didn't you just say so, sweetie?"  
  
The Tarlys already knew that Sam liked boys, thanks to the time Talla had found his secret online crush blog about the famous movie star, Loras Tyrell, and had told everyone about it. Randyll had been angry at first, but had slowly and begrudgingly gotten over his shock. "He's already a bookworm who throws like a girl. It can't really get much worse, can it?" Randyll had grumbled.  
  
Now that he'd told his mom what was going on, Sam was actually quite eager to tell her all about this secret boy. "His name is Jon Snow. He's from up north and he just transferred here. Some stupid jocks were pushing me around and knocking my books out of my hands--"  
  
"Oh, Sam!" Melessa interrupted sympathetically.  
  
"Don't worry, Mom, this is the good part! So anyway, they were trying to shove me around and Jon totally came up and punched the quarterback right in the face!"  
  
"That's a good part?"  
  
"Yes! He told them to quit picking on me or they'd have him to deal with! No one's messed with me ever since. He's on the football team, too, but he's not a jerk like those other guys. He's been sitting with me everyday at lunch. He's so handsome, Mom. He has curly hair, and these _amazing_ eyes...and I think he may like me, too. He carried my books to class for me today...although he might have just been being nice because he saw that I checked out so many from the library that they wouldn't all fit in my bookbag."  
  
"He sounds wonderful, honey...although I don't approve of fighting at school. But I'm glad he helped you. Do you think that he's..." Melessa trailed off awkwardly.  
  
"Gay?" Sam filled in. "I'm not sure. But he has these pink sunglasses _just like_ Loras Tyrell's, so it's possible!"  
  
After Sam's confession, his mother managed to keep the news about his crush to herself. She knew that Randyll wouldn't appreciate hearing about it and Sam's siblings would just tease him.  
  
Her discretion was proved to be unnecessary a few days later when Sam made the following announcement at dinner.  
  
"Family...I just want to tell you...I have a boyfriend. Jon Snow at school asked me out today." Sam was looking embarrassed, yet seemed to have a permanent grin stuck on his face.  
  
The little sisters saw that he was happy and politely smiled at his announcement, and Dickon just cocked his head to the side in confusion, but Talla snorted rudely.  
  
"As if, Sam! Since when does anyone at your school like you?"  
  
"Since now, _Talla_ ," Sam answered back curtly. "Our first date is on Saturday. He's so wonderful--he gets good grades and he plays football and he's really cute!"  
  
"And why," Randyll spoke up, "would a boy like that ask _you_ out?"  
  
"Randyll!" Melessa reprimanded.  
  
"You know we were all thinking it, Melessa," he continued. He turned his gaze back to Sam. "You don't need to make up stupid stories to impress us, boy. Nobody expects you to have friends, let alone find someone to date you in high school!"  
  
Sam's face was flushed with mixed anger and embarrassment, and he stood up from the table and rushed off without saying a word. Melessa chased after him to comfort him, and the rest of the table finished their dinner in awkward silence, until Talla broke the quiet.  
  
"Imagine!" she huffed. "Sam with a sexy boyfriend!"

Sam didn't say anything else about Jon Snow after that night at dinner. His sisters and father, however, took up the new hobby of cleverly inserting "Sam's little boyfriend" into every conversation, laughing to themselves as they did. Sam just turned red and clenched his jaw, refusing to take the bait, and his family grew even more firm in their belief that Jon Snow as a thoroughly imaginary paramour.

That Saturday night, however, the doorbell rang just as the Tarly family sat down at the table for dinner.

"Now who could that be?" Randyll grumbled.

"I'll get it, Dad," Sam answered quickly. He jumped out of his seat and hurried to the door.

"Well, that was the fastest I've ever seen Sam move," Randyll remarked sarcastically.

His joke turned into an open-mouthed gape, however, when Sam entered the room holding hands with an extremely handsome boy.

"Everybody," Sam said loudly, "I'd like you to meet Jon Snow."

"Hi, sir, you must be Sam's dad," Jon said politely, sticking his hand out toward Randyll.

Randyll sputtered incoherently for a few moments before he accepted Jon's hand and gave it a limp shake.

Jon introduced himself to the rest of the family with equal manners (even making Melessa and Talla giggle by smiling charmingly at them as he introduced himself). Then he sat down next to Sam, smiling and comfortable as though he ate dinner there every night.

"So Jon, how did you meet Sam?" Talla asked, apparently having put on her company manners.

"Oh, I saw him my first day at school. He had, well...dropped his books and I helped him pick them up, and he looked at me and blushed and he was just so...adorable." Jon smiled at Sam over his shoulder, and Sam dreamily smiled back. "We got to talking and I just knew we'd be friends. Or, you know..." He reached down and squeezed Sam's hand under the table.

The Tarly family spent the rest of the meal making polite conversation with Jon, who repeatedly turned the discussion back to how smart, funny, and adorable Sam was. By the end of dinner, all of the Tarlys were shocked into silence--except for Sam, who was glowing with pleasure, and Melessa, who was beaming with motherly pride.

The surprising evening didn't even end when dinner did. An hour after they'd all left the table, the relative quiet of the Tarly house was broken by Dickon running down the hall, squealing "Ewww, Mama, Sam is kissing Jon Snow in his bedroom! They're even sticking their tongues out! Make them stop!"

After this, Randyll not-so-politely suggested that it was time for Jon to be getting home now.

For the first time, Randyll Tarly felt a bit of begrudging admiration for his eldest son, as he watched Sam walk his football player boyfriend to the door.

That begrudging pride, however, didn't stop Randyll from telling Sam to go upstairs and put on a shirt with a collar, for God's sake, because nobody wanted to see that giant hickey on his neck.  



End file.
